Notre Dame was jumped by multitude of teams including Florida, Tennessee, Texas and Georgia Tech in the various rankings and Weis wasn't pleased. "One of the teams (Tennessee) that jumped us had the same game that we had. They're down, they're playing at home and they win by a field goal. Another team (Florida) that jumped us wasn't even playing. They were home eating cheeseburgers and they end up jumping us. That befuddles me," said Weis.

What befuddles me is, when will coaches learn that as soon as you start worrying about the polls instead of taking care of business on the field, your team loses focus and you often begin losing games? Just ask Tommy Tuberville. But, apparently Weis realizes that the Irish schedule is so weak the next couple of weeks, focus won't matter so it's time to bitch, bitch, bitch away.

One thing I've always respected about Lloyd Carr is, in all his years as Michigan's head coach, say what you will about the man, but I don't ever remember him playing trying to talk his team up for the benefit of some pollsters. Granted, besides this season and '97, there really wasn't a need but you get my point. I've always found such begging for votes a bit cheesey. Like that annoying, kinda-hot-but-not-hot-enough girl in high school trying her damndest to swing the Homecoming Queen vote when she's really not in the same league as the smokin' chick who transferred to your city from IHitPubertyAtElevenville in 10th grade.

And we're not the only ones talking about Charlie's whining. DJ Gallo wrote a great piece about it on ESPN.com (HT: DW) saying he's befuddled by a couple things himself, asking Charlie, "How you were able to dupe Notre Dame into giving you a 10-year contract worth nearly $40 million after starting your career 5-2 without a single win against a team that finished the season ranked in the Top 25. That's a bit befuddling. As is the fact that you are regarded as some sort of football god even though the next good team your Fighting Irish beat will be the first. In your tenure you have played three good teams (so much for the perception that Notre Dame plays a brutal schedule, huh?): USC last October, Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl and Michigan five weeks ago. You were blown out in two of those three games. But, yeah, you almost beat USC. Congratulations. Heck of a moral victory there. That's exactly why you were hired. For moral victories."

35 comments:

Outstanding post, Yost (hey! I'm a poet and I didn't know it!). I visit BGS, HRB, and Rakes of Mallow almost daily and I'm stunned that none of them are angry, upset, or worried about barely winning games vs. extremely mediocre teams like Georgia Tech, MSU and UCLA. All they can talk about is how thrilling the win was, and the genius of Weis (OMG HE ALWAYS GOES FOR IT ON 4TH WOOOOO AWSUM!!!), and the zen mastery and vulcan mind-melds of Quinn and Samardzija (sp?). I think it's because they're in deep, deep denial about how weak and fragile their team really is. It's okay to hype the fact that you keep winning and that "they don't ask how, they just ask how many", but only if you've won them all - not if you've been decimated by somebody already... even if that "somebody" is the 2nd-best team in the country.

Just for good measure, Gallo also quotes Weis on the subject of ND's chances to play in Glendale (which Weis refuses to discount, because he's an idiot), and Gallo reasonably assures Cheeseburger Charlie that he would certainly be facing either OSU or UM, and that either of us would "crush" the Irish.

I have a feeling you guys are about to start stomping them about 8 or 9 out of every 10 games, and that the Wolverines are going to become an albatross around Weis' neck (it might actually take TWO albatrossi to make it all the way around those jowls). I just wish we Buckeyes could get in on the fun and didn't have to rely on memories of the mid-90's home-and-home whipping we handed the Rudys.

Your crying baby picture of Weiss forgot to inlcude a picture of thast freaking "hubcap" of a title ring (wrong league fathead) that he wore during the "befuddled" press conference. Speaking of Fathead - I heard Fathead declined to carry his picture in their wall life-size sticker lineup for two reasons. One, their printing press wasn;t big enough and two, the sticker violated most towns building codes prohibiting billboards in residential areas.

It's not as fun to read as Gallo (I love the in your face humor), but it does a good job of chopping Charlie's argument to shreds in a non-confrontational way. I especially like that he points out that NDs offense has actually regressed this year, despite returning everyone of consequence save Fasano. I'm surprised none of those ND blogs are a bit worried about that. Maybe there are extenuating circumstances I'm not aware of, but I certainly thought they'd be really good on O - but they are only pretty good from what I've seen.

What they conveniently forget is that they were given the #2 slot in the beginning without merit. The loss in the Fiesta Bowl could have been much worse had it not been for 2 missed FG's and 2 fumbles deep in ND territory. That defense is awful, slow and not fundamentally sound. The offensive line is porous. If you think ND is in denial this year, wait till they don't have Quinn, Samardzija, Abiamiri, Zibikowski etc... next year. I think you can reference PSU, Texas, Arkansas and anyone not named SC as to how hard it is to win with a first year QB. UM should put a biblical thumping on these charlatains next year, then we'll see how the excuses flow out of South Bend.

NDNation has to be the funniest read right now. They are in a constant lather because Troy Smith is favored over their beloved Quinn. They ignore the beating UM gave them and point to all of the come from behind wins. They ignore the fact that OSU hasn't fallen behind to have to come back. Solid QB play kept OSU in front. Troy has better numbers except total yardage. That's because he doesn't pass 35-40 times per game and is usually a cheerleader in the 4th quarter.

BTW Yost, have you noticed the similarities to OSU's season this year to UM's 1997. Heisman candidate, undefeated, playing last game at home vs. highly ranked rival etc...November 18 will be the greatest of all, in the greatest rivalry in sports!

BTW Yost, have you noticed the similarities to OSU's season this year to UM's 1997. Heisman candidate, undefeated, playing last game at home vs. highly ranked rival etc...November 18 will be the greatest of all, in the greatest rivalry in sports!

Yeah -- Maybe the Bucks can also beat Michigan, win their bowl game, have a coaching legend decide he is going to retire, and get fucked out of celebrating a full national championship by a bunch of idiots...

Actually reading the transcript or watching the press conference would put the quotes into context. The ellipses in the middle of one of the quotes is a reference to the writer, who was asking the question, and the article doesn't mention the general laughter that accompanied the exchange. Admittedly, reading the quotes as they were presented shows a bitter, angry man, but its taken out of context when you consider the rest of the dialogue (something along the lines of the polls working themselves out by the end of the season) and humor between the press and Weis. Its all factual correct, but spun in such a way to create a story, which it apparently has.

Michigan already did put a biblical thumping on those charlatains. I would certainly love another. Lloyd should, to quote Mike Valenti, stick the knife reeeal deep and watch the blood squirt out all over.

My beloved Irish take it on the chin -ouch it hurts hitting the canvas that hard. But nevertheless I keep coming back to the web site bc its this kind of acerbic humor that makes the site great. We are a midiocre team and knowledgable fans should admit that.

But CW has instilled a winning attitude (insert pithy remark here) that Ty couldn't. Time will tell whether he's worth the $40M or not.

Read the transcript instead of just spouting off on bits and pieces of a whole. As I stated, it looks like a bitter and angry rant and I was very surprised to hear about it, but my opinion changed when I read the whole transcript. Puts the comments in context and doesn't look nearly as bad as how you would like it to be. Think for yourself instead of letting the media tell how to react.

The transcript of the quotes in question...unabridged. They can be found at www.und.com. Immediately following the comments that everyone is throwing a hissy fit over is the comment about the polls working themselves out. not five questions before or five questions after, but immediately following. Enjoy. But before anyone starts laughing at ND's chances for a national championship game appearance, everyone already knows that the chances are slim to none. That's why the chances are called "remote" in multiple occasions.

Q. What's your reaction to after a win you drop one in the AP Poll, two in the Coach Poll, one in the BCS? COACH Charlie Weis: Well, the things that surprise me are in that situation - I'll just cite a couple of them, like one of the teams that jumped us had the same game that we had. Another down, they're playing at home, they're down and they win by a field goal. Another team that jumped us wasn't even playing. They're sitting at home eating cheeseburgers, and they ended up jumping us. So that befuddles me. We go into a game with 27 seconds to go, come from behind, win a thrilling game, and because we win a thrilling game, let's move us down because one team is not playing and the other team had the exact same game, exactly the same. Tell me how that works. Maybe I'm just stupid, just tell me how that works. You're on the AP, tell me how that works (laughter). Q. I don't get a vote. A lot of times you say you don't worry about the poll. When do you begin worrying about those things? COACH Charlie Weis: Well, the number one thing is you want, hey - let's be very practical here, okay. Would I love for Notre Dame to play for the National Championship this year? Absolutely. Is it a chance that it happens? Remote. Is there a chance? Yeah, there's a chance because any team with one loss has a chance of playing for it. Now, a lot of things have to happen now, okay. A lot of things have to happen. But is there a chance? I'd say there's a chance. It's remote. Would you agree with that? It's remote, but would you say there's a chance? Remote. Other than that, what's the next thing you want? Well, you'd like to play in one of the big games. So what do you have to do? Then you have to win. That's what you have to do. If you win, things usually end up taking care of themselves. There's great wins, there's ugly wins, okay, but they all ?? they're all wins, and when it's all said and done, the teams that are going to have a chance to play in those games are going to be the teams that won enough games to be in that position.

Not to worry matsut. We are paying attention to the fact that ND is winning close games against very average competition. Don't assume we're sticking our heads in the sand about it. At the same time, we're also not going to freak out about it and start posting doom and gloom.

I believe YOU Michigan fans have been so long without a head coach with a personality that you show your spitefulness towards someone like Coach Weis. Bo S. a angry man, would have gone out like Woody. Moeller, zip in the personality dept. & Lloyd doesn't have a clue. By the way how is Arrington doing in his Anger Mgmet. classes. Hard to believe but your posts have me rooting for tosu. Your a bunch of front runners. I remember your blogs pre the season. Fire Lloyd. You can't spell Lloyd without two LL's.

You don't remember us saying fire Lloyd on this site. That's because, even at the darkest hour in the wake of the 7-5 season, when many were calling for just that, Benny and I have always supported him 100%.

As for anger management, good to see you not overreacting to a blog post. Can one not criticize the ND coach? And it's not like we were the only ones.

Yost & Benny; My apologies. I should be taking those classes with name withheld. I think what upset me was I viewed the press conference in its entirety. und.com, & everything CW said was with a laugh & a smile. ND & UM have always had I thought a great relationship, but hearing from Lloyd & Bo about UM not needing ND is too ridiculous to respond to. It is not ND that is cancelling the season after '08 it is UM. Another Mich. duirectional scholl perhaps in the Big House? Great sell out crummy game. I'd rather see ND take on Um & lose then beat a E. Mich or W. Mich. To end I thought the graciousness of CW's remarks about UM & Coach Carr were quite magnanimous. Evidently this was also missed in your analysis of the game. Maybe your just so use to bitter pissed off losers.e.g Joe Pa, Tessel, Smith, Mason.PS. Exactly who did UM beat to propel them to the #2 ranking. Vandy, the Mich directional schools, no it was ND.

I don't think there is one person out there saying we should replace ND with a crap school. Instead, I (like many others) would simply like to see M/ND play two on-two off so that we could also play, say, Texas one year, LSU, etc.

There is no way, in this day and age if you're in conference, that we'd ever add such games w/ ND on the schedule, not when pollsters give more weight to simply being undefeated (see: WVU). So, it's not a slam, at least on my part.

As for Bo, who knows what his motivation was. But Lloyd has never said anything on the subject as far as I know.

Bo said the Big Ten needs to stop subsidizing Notre Dame football. He was absolutely correct. Join our conference or stop playing our teams 6 times a year. Stop getting the milk for free and buy the cow.

He was absolutely correct. I'd much rather have a home and home vs. a high profile SEC team. Notre Dame doesn't deserve it.

jeremy. Bo is a blowhard. Everyear he talks the same garbage. He had his chance the last few years. So he schedules E. Mich, Ball State,WTF,& W. Mich. Bo doesn't want to do that. Neither does the Big 11. With the additinal game why not make it mandatory to add another conference game. ND does not need UM of the Big Ten. You don't think they could replace those four Big Ten teams in a nano second? Stop being delusional next you'll be saying UM is a better school academical then Cal, UCLA, UNC. OR UT.in Austin.

Yost touched a nerve huh? You can of course (UM) play anyone as can the Big 10, do you really think ND would have an iota of difficulty in replacing them with a couple of Big 12 & SEC games? By the way how aare the UM rankings for atheletes on graduation. Not the NCAA ones the Federal rate & also for their minority athletes? ISN&WR do they have ND ranked above old UM???. Giggles.

Any bets as to who will end their coaching career with more National Championships: Carr or Weis? My money is on Charlie (that is spotting LLoyd the one has already. Oh, as I am sure you are all aware, Weis' first one will put him one ahead of Bo.

"And just so you know, I'm basing my comments on CW on newspaper transcripts."

Thanks for confirming that all the venom and discussion of these quotes comes completely from the newspaper article vice any research into the comments. Now that you have seen the context, care to put together a few comments taking back some of the things in this post or just let it all go because it fits the image of those whining Irish?

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